New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1887-01-05
THE CALICO FROCK.

1t wasn't a hot day. nor cold day,
nor a damp day, but it was an afro
cious day, a clammy day, an unbeara-
BILE day, a day that made your clothes
stick to you like poor relations, that
brought out cold sweats on pitchers
and goblets, that made your back a
race course for contemplate little
chills and the rest OF your body tar
get for a thousand invisible pins and
needles, that made the grasshopper a
burden and the dusty, begrimed city
pandemonium. that made Solomon
Griggs, bachelor, of the firm OF Griggs,
Makem & Co., the great clothing mer-
chants, shut up his ledger with a bang
and start for the country by the next
train, remarking to the old Grimesby,
the head clerk, "that the city was
sitting" TO which that worthy re-
piled: $50 it Isl; but how about the
fellers that can't get out Of it and
must stay to be choked?"-a problem
which suspect our friend of the firm
OF Griggs, Makem & Co. troubled his
head very little about, being just then
busy in looking into the dusty recesses
OF that picture gallery which memory
furnishes and arranges for us all, al
a:single landscape hanging there. A
low house with messy, overhanging
caves, standing on the slope ola green
hill, shaded by branching elms, with
level fields stretching off in the fore
ground toward the sparkling water
on one side and dusky woods on the
other, and there, dusty, sweating, and
tired, Solomon found himself just
about sunset. Out came q ruddy-
checked, smiling old lady in cap and
an apron, that had attained q state
of snowy perfection unknown to city
laundresses.
"Why, bless ME, if it isn't little Sol.
why, who'd thought OF seeing
your" and she folded the stalwart
bearded man in as warm an embrace
as though he were in reality still the
little Sol. of former days.
and how do you do, SOL? Come
in, come in; don't stand out there.
You know the little path and the
way to the pantry yet, dare say.
T0,,on i,,.x I,>,& c&o VT Io
only Rachel"
"But I didn't know you had any
young ladies with you, Aunt HESTER
It only Rachel, Itell you Rachel
Hart, the seamstress. Are there no
women in your city, that you are
afraid to face a little country girl"
''Little indeed" thought Solomon,
as he acknowledged his aunt's some
what peculiar introduction-and not
pretty either-with large eyes of that
uncertain gray that sometimes beams
darkly blue and then deepens into
brown; with a smooth, low forehead,
and light brown hair drawn tightly
across each ear, Just revealing it's
crimson tip; a face irregularly feat
ured. and rendered still more striking
by the singular contrast between its
extreme pallor and the intensely scar
let lips-the personiication of neat
ness, the embodiment of reserve.
An odd little person." thought
Solomon, ''but it's none of my bust
ness" and disnlissing her from his
mind. he proceeded to the much more
important business of making him
self presentable at Aunt Hester's tea
table.
Solomon did ample justice to the
snowy bread, golden butter, and lus-
cious Strawberries, and later, as that
worthy was indnlging IN stroll
across the fields, he lifted up his eyes
and beheld the little seamstress,
whose existence he had quite forgot
ten, under q venerable cherry tree,
making desperate Efforts to seize a
tempting branch on its lowest boughs
revealing in her gyrations a very
neat foot and ankle, and looking al
most pretty with her flushed cheeks
and sparkling eyes.
Now Sol was a gallant man-decid-
eddy the preux chevalier Of the firm
of Griggs, Makem & Co., so that
whenever, as had once or twice hap
pened. q petticoat ventured into the
moldy shades of that establishment.
Sol was the man whom destiny ana
the other partners selected to parley
with the enemy.
Advancing, therefore, with happy
mixture Of comic ence and condescen-
sion, Sol plucked the cherries and was
about to present them when indepen-
dence ia q calico frock stepped back
and with q cool:
:. Keep them yourself, sir; ! don't
care for them. =
s. thought You wanted them
stammered Sol.